Welcome to my life...

Well, hello there....

Let's start with the pleasantries, shall we?

My name is Kristi.

I'm married to Eric.

We have a daughter (almost 19 months as of today) named Ava.

I'm taking a break from my job as a high school English teacher to be a stay-at-home mother

....and I just found out that I'm preggers with number two.

Got it? There will be a test later.

I figured that this would be a good time to start a blog so that I can document my experiences as I get more and more pregnant and have a toddler at home who is very much entering that "What exactly do you mean by NO?" phase. Oh, what crazy shenanigans will ensue, I'm sure.

I got the positive result just a couple days ago on July 7, 2008. That means, this baby should be popping out somewhere around March 22, 2009. That is, unless he or she decides to mess with mommy and force the date up by three weeks (Long story...but let's just say that Ava was stubborn before she was even out of the womb) .

So....here's the kick in the pants for you all today....

The day after I got my positive result, I ended up with HORRIBLE diarrhea.

(Oh, maybe this is where I tell you that this is MY blog, and I tend to be very straight-forward and descriptive about whatever happens to be going on in my life at that time. If that has to be about my bowel function...so be it....)

Moving on...

I tried to think nothing of it. Well, atleast ignore it as much as you can as you are pushing your grocery cart swiftly down the store aisle to the restroom while trying to simultaneously hold your cheeks together. I mean, come on, I'm pregnant. This must just be a pregnancy symptom, right? I didn't have it with Ava, but all pregnancies are different I hear.

I stopped trying to ignore it somewhere between noticing blood in my poo and feeling like someone poured a mixture of Clorox bleach, apple cider vinegar and death juice into my intestines.

So...I go to the doctor. It went somewhere along these lines...

"Doc. I think my stomach is going to implode. And, if I push any harder, I'm going to push out a four week old embryo. I'd like to keep the baby in there long enough to not look like tiny sea monkey if I could."

"Hmmmmmmmmm.......let's do some fecal testing."

"Great idea. Let's do more work on my already fatigued bum-hole. It sounds fabulous."

"Well, if you want, I can send you home with some of the containers, and you can do it yourself when you go to the bathroom. Then, just bring it back in."

"I can't think of a better way to spend my day. Let's do it."

This man sends me home with FOUR containers that I have to fill to a certain line with my own poo. I'm not sure if you are understanding the gravity of the situation here. I'm on the can every five minutes so that I can shoot out the equivalent of a firey liquid dime, and I have to now do it in a poo catcher contraption, scoop it out with a wooden tongue depresser and put it in a container until the preservation liquid gets up to a certain line. I quickly realize that this is going to take approximately thirty-two poo experiences to fill ONE bottle. By the time these are filled, I will either be all better or dead with a poop scooper in my hand and my pride nowhere to be found. Lovely.

And...as all you pregnant women with hightened smells out there know, there is just nothing better than sitting there whiffing your own poo-funk when you can already smell what Mrs. Johnson cooked for dinner across the street six days ago. Yea me.

So...as this first post greets you, Ava isn't even awake yet, I am trying to get over this intestinal thing, and I'm hoping that my little sea monkey isn't in there holding what will one day be a nose and saying, "Thanks mom. This horrifically smelling womb is just awesome. Well done."

Uh oh...gotta go. Mr. Poo is knocking on the back door.

Welcome to my world. It's quite a ride...